The Sunday Circle is the weekly check-in where I ask the creative-types who follow this blog to weigh in about their goals, inspirations, and challenges for the coming week. The logic behind it can be found here. Want to be involved? It’s easy – just answer three questions in the comments or on your own blog (with a link in the comments here, so that everyone can find them).
After that, throw some thoughts around about other people’s projects, ask questions if you’re so inclined. Be supportive above all.
Then show up again next Sunday when the circle updates next, letting us know how you did on your weekly project and what you’ve got coming down the pipe in the coming week (if you’d like to part of the circle, without subscribing to the rest of the blog, you can sign-up for reminders via email here).
MY CHECK-IN
What am I working on this week?
My plans went somewhat awry over the last week, largely because I kicked off a new approach to planning novels after reading Alexandra Sokoloff’s Stealing Hollywood and started to figure out a way of fusing my love of literary analysis with some of the techniques in Accidental Creative to get around my usual problems with plotting. The result was a lot of work done, but none of it what I’d intended.
This week, with the new job kicking off in two days, I’m sticking with simple goals: move through the next page of my eleven-page planning document (mostly questions to answer) and revising a short story about flying crocodiles I’ve got kicking around on my hard drive.
What’s inspiring me this week?
Catherynne Valente’s The Bread They Eat in Dreams, which is currently proving to be a short story collection that just nails it story after story. Different voices and approaches every time, but unified by the sense of experimentation, self-awareness about the rules of story and how they shape our identities, and the utterly gorgeous language being used.
What part of my project an I avoiding?
Scheduling is my weakness at the moment. I do less than I’d like in the mornings, but pack social stuff into the evenings which means that I don’t ever get more than the morning shift as a writer. It’s not quite enough to be satisfying, but I haven’t yet hit the point where I’ve put together an actual plan for getting more done.
I also need to figure out where the money is in the flying crocodile story. It’s got an ending, but not the ending.
